With the rising cost of fossil fuels and increased energy demand in the world's economies and industries, different and more efficient methods of developing energy sources are constantly being sought. Of particular interest are renewable alternative energy sources, such as solar power devices with batteries, windmill farms, tidal power generation, wave generators, and systems deriving power from sequestered hydrogen.
However, such energy sources are not yet capable of delivering continuous power to a widespread area on a commercial scale. Moreover, some proposed technologies, such as hydrogen powered systems involving the refinement of seawater, actually consume more power in the conversion process than is output at the end of the system.
Others, such as hydrogen derived from methane, produce equal or greater amounts of fossil fuel emissions than the conventional oil-based technologies they are intended to replace, and still others, such as battery, solar and windmill based systems, require such consistent exposure to significant sunlight or winds that their commercial effectiveness is inherently limited.
One proposed alternative energy system involves the harnessing of hydro power derived from fast moving water currents, for example, currents having peak flow velocities of 2 m/s or more.
In practice, however, existing underwater power generating devices have proven inadequate, even where installed at sites where current velocities are consistently very fast. This is due, at least in part, to both a lack of efficient means for generating the power and lack of suitable power transformation systems necessary to compensate for incompatibilities between underwater power generating systems and attendant land or waterborne power relay stations.
Existing propeller designs and waterborne power generating mechanisms have also proven to be inadequate, failing to provide either adequate energy generation or sufficient stability against maximum or velocity currents.
To capture a significant amount of kinetic energy from flowing ocean currents, the affected area must be expansive. As a result, existing marine propeller designs employ prohibitively large, heavy and expensive structures made from currently known heavy metal and composite metal technologies. Moreover, these marine propellers create cavitation issues originating from the tips of the propeller blades moving through surrounding water.
Another significant problem is the environmental issues associated with obtaining energy from water currents without damaging surrounding aquatic life, such as reefs, marine foliage, schools of fish, etc.
There is, therefore, an important and as yet unmet need for a water current power generation system and accompanying subsystems that overcome the problems currently existing in the art, and which generate and compatibly transfer a significant amount of power to a relay station in a safe, reliable, and environmentally-friendly manner. Safe and efficient field-level configurations, reliable and repeatable mooring systems, and methods and means for installing and maintaining such systems are also required.